Invisible Talent Market: Solving the Talent Shortage Without Outsourcing and Visas

By Ida Byrd-Hill

Invisible Talent Market is a Diversity & Inclusion guide, utilizing economic history of Blacks, to lay the foundation that grooming Blacks with digital business skills is a viable strategy to reduce America’s talent shortage, without outsourcing and visas, as Blacks satisfied the talent shortages of the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions.

Invisible Talent Market highlights the idea that “Booker T. Washington presented slavery plantations as the industrial training that left Blacks after the Civil War“ in possession of nearly all the common and skilled labor in the South.

He stated “In most cases if a Southern White man wanted a house built, he consulted a Negro mechanic about the plan and about the actual building of the structure. If he wanted a suit of clothes made he went to a Negro tailor, and for shoes he went to a shoemaker of the same race.” In fact, the Land Grant College Act of 1862 was spurred by this dearth of industrial skills of Whites after slavery.

These stereotype has been normalized into society’s culture and baked into the foundational policies of institutions. This is INSTITUTIONAL RACISM. Corporations, municipalities and philanthropies practice this institutional racism every day ‘MURDERING’ African Americans economically.

Institutional Racism has allowed HR departments to create ‘cultural fit’ concept to keep African Americans out of high-paying tech jobs.

Institutional Racism has allowed unions to create non-standardized exams without published scores to keep African Americans out of construction and manufacturing jobs.

Institutional Racism has allowed managers to write stereotypical statements, such as “You lack work ethic” or “you are aggressive” into performance appraisals to limit career promotion.

Institutional Racism has caused mass incarceration of Black people as every action is criminalized.

Institutional Racism has caused companies to create tech products like face recognition that do not detect Black people accurately, yet criminal justice department desire to utilize as a tool.

Institutional Racism has allowed police departments to lynch and beat African Americans, without punishment, for 155 years as they did during slavery.

George Floyd justice demands American leaders to reflect, “Is my institutional policies and actions ‘MURDERING’ or ‘UPLIFTING’ African Americans?

Read Invisible Talent Market and determine if you or your corporation is practicing Racism.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ida Byrd-Hill
• Release date: Jun 12, 2020
• ISBN: 9780982961018

Ida Byrd-Hill

Ida Byrd-Hill is known as an urban economist, futurist, diversity & inclusion specialist, who has radically transformed 6 urban public schools. She is the President of Uplift, Inc., a nonprofit complex strategy firm where she combines her personal experience of migrating out of poverty with her corporate experience in Executive Search, Finance, HR, Marketing and Sales to assist corporations develop talent for their employee base. Her radical projects, Automation Workz, Fluke, Hustle & TECHknow and Weyn, have been recognized by Automation Alley, Associated Press, Daytime TV, Essence Magazine, Xconomy and other media outlets. Ida has a BA in Economics from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor 1989 and a MBA from Jack Welch Management Institute 2014.

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INVISIBLE TALENT MARKET

Solving the Talent Shortage

Without Outsourcing and Visas

Ida Byrd-Hill

Testimonial

Kudos to Ida for writing this diversity & inclusion guide that highlights Blacks as viable candidates to solve the ‘digital talent shortage.’ As a member of the Invisible Talent Market, I created Blendoor to capture candidate data from existing applicant tracking systems and/or online job boards. Candidate profiles are then ‘blendorized’ - displayed without name, photo, or dates to mitigate unconscious bias. We are proving a qualified and diverse technical pipeline exists. Our growing database of candidates seeking to match with inclusive companies is 68% Women, 40% Black /Latino /Native, and 26% technical.

Stephanie Lampkin

CEO, Blendoor

Dedication

I dedicate this book to Black Mothers who are fighting daily to ensure their children have a seat at America’s Economic Table of prosperity during this digital revolution.

I fought, vehemently, for my children Kevin and Karen Hill to be at that table. Kevin is graduating from Rochester Institute of Technology with a BS in Information Technology. He is completing a co-op assignment as a web developer. I look forward to his continual growth as a member of this Invisible Talent Market.

I thank my mother, Mary Byrd, for fighting to get me into Walker Elementary School for the Gifted. While she did not have a high school diploma or college degree then (She subsequently went back and received both.) She was quite wise to pave the way for me to become one of America’s Educated.

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CONTROL NUMBER

2017902943

INVISIBLE TALENT MARKET

Solving the Talent Shortage Without Outsourcing and Visas

ISBN (pbk.) 978-098296-10-3-2

1. Business Culture 2. HR 3. Economics History

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1 Change In The Air Under President Trump Regime

Chapter 2 Blacks Rescued Agricultural Revolution Talent Shortage

Chapter 3 Blacks Rescued Industrial Revolution Talent Shortage

Chapter 4 The Great Migration and Race Riots

Chapter 5 Black Brawn Vs White Brains

Chapter 6 Blacks Driving Mobile Tech Usage

Chapter 7 Underserved = Economic Profit

References

Introduction

Invisible Talent Market is a Diversity & Inclusion guide, utilizing economic history of Blacks, to lay the foundation that grooming Blacks with digital business skills is a viable strategy to reduce America’s talent shortage, without outsourcing and visas, as Blacks satisfied the talent shortages of the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions.

This book actually began in 1997 when I was sent by Junior Achievement to teach an Economics class to some 3rd graders at Clark Elementary, the largest Detroit Public School elementary school. As a University of Michigan trained economist and President of The Harvard Group Wealth Management LLC, I deviated from the lesson and taught these students a lesson on the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) and the Stock Market. The DJIA endured a drop the week after I left. When I returned to the school the following week, the students, full of excitement, explained the stock market drop to me. I thought their teacher gave them an assignment to follow the DJIA. She had not. They followed it on their own.

When those students were promoted to the 4th grade, I discovered they were labelled learning disabled. That should have been private. I continued to teach them economics all year, reaching out to their parents, who lived two subdivisions from my house. On the surface, they lived in the ‘hood, but had a very cultured middle-class lifestyle. Amazingly these students matriculated to a few of the college prep Detroit high schools and then off to college. They became successful as they had the full support of their newly enlightened parents, despite being labelled and tracked for failure. I pondered this hypothesis - What if we groomed parents with the requisite technology skills utilizing their favorite tech tools to prepare them for the corporate world. Could we solve Corporate America’s talent shortage across 2 generations simultaneously?

My story

I spent 5th through 9th grade in a suburban Flint neighborhood attending a fast paced suburban elementary and junior high school. I had Algebra in the 8th grade and Geometry in the 9th grade. High schools introduce Algebra in the 9th grade and Geometry in the 10th grade. My parents divorced. My mother, siblings and I moved to a roach infested housing project where girls routinely birthed babies at age 16. That was not my dream. My dream, at the time, was to become a physician and eventually an astronaut as I loved space technology.

I was told by my high school counselor I was not college material despite the fact I ranked 5th in my graduating class, scored 80th percentile on the ACT in the 10th grade, and qualified for MENSA while in high school. My high school counselor judged my potential based on the color of my skin and my residency in a HUD housing project as the other high-ranking students had affluent families and lived in an affluent neighborhood.

Mainstream society sees the phrase urban genius as an oxymoron, judging students in high poverty areas as failures. Everyone, including my mother, knew I was an urban genius. I was lucky to have her fight for my success bridging the gap with teachers, like Ted Lau, my chemistry and computer programming teacher. Ted Lau was a MENSA member, who dragged me from MENSA meeting to MENSA meeting as my IQ he states was astronomical.

I went on to receive 11 college acceptances. I matriculated and graduated from the University of Michigan – Ann Arbor with a Bachelor’s degree in Economics in 1989 and a MBA from Jack Welch Management Institute. I walked into a school in 1997 and pondered, How many urban geniuses were overlooked because they do not look the way Corporate America or mainstream desires? While I pondered that hypothesis, I built my career to assist people improve their lives financially. Here is my career history.

ADMINISTRATION/ HUMAN RESOURCES/ TECHNOLOGY

• Managed Employee Relations function for 5 companies including Diversity & Inclusion

• Established contract high school culture, curriculum, professional development and partners

• Created Compensation Administration Program for 2 companies

• Provided customer service and technical support for technology companies: AT&T, Sirius XM

• Participated in computerization of 2 departments and 3 companies

• Managed company computer network

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT/ SALES/ADVOCACY

• Advocated for the passage of 2 bills that were signed into law January 2010

• Managing marketing, PR and funding for school 4 businesses

• Generated 2200 wealthy individual and 10 corporate clients

• Developed client base for executive search firm.

FINANCE/ DATA

• Compile Data reports of constituents’ habits and behaviors

• Create Data Mining activities to collect market and business information

• Managed 353 million in assets business owners and high net worth persons

• Analyzed potential business opportunities

• Guided mortgage loan applications through underwriting

• Closed $1,000,000 of loans monthly with average loan of $50,000

• Decreased accounts outstanding 90 plus days from 32% to 6.5%.

• Negotiated and collected $1,980,000 from 3 major commercial clients.

• Prepared 941 Federal, State and Local Tax returns.

• Participated in Workmen’s Compensation Audits

• Prepared weekly payroll

RECRUITING

• Placed 72 corporate executives in technical law positions

• Recruited for 3 skilled trades/apprenticeships

• Recruited